


we can do the tango (just for two)

by orphan_account



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Office, Fluff and Humor, M/M, Romantic Comedy, Short & Sweet, but so is newt! soulmates, hermann’s a mess, i can not stress how much of a gay disaster hermann becomes, vanessa as hermann’s cool lesbian friend
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-19
Updated: 2018-05-19
Packaged: 2019-05-08 21:54:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14703132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The problems start when Newt Geiszler is hired.The problems are synonymous with Newt Geiszler being hired.





	we can do the tango (just for two)

And the thing that Hermann likes about the bull pen isn’t the structure- no, it’s the  _ purpose.  _

 

It’s a very one-track environment, he supposes, there is a job to do and the means to get there. It all adds up to an endless slew of monotony and glass offices and Tendo forgetting everyone’s orders and buying each person a cappuccino instead. A streamlined world of identical days lined up end to end that blur into one another. 

 

There are office christmas parties, ones where Vanessa from HR shoves him into a sweater with little pom poms sewn onto the offensively bright knit tree as ornaments. There are office halloween parties, ones where Vanessa from HR shoves him into a costume by slapping a name tag with some funny pun he forgets (“Hello my name is… Jake from State Farm”) on the front of his button up. There’s a celebratory party for the team’s collective effort when Pentecost’s nominated for the presidential race, that’s the one where Vanessa from HR doesn’t bring any costumes but she does hit Hermann on the back to make him sit upright and tells him to look happy. 

 

It’s whatever. Hermann’s twenty four and he likes his life, he really does. The effort it took to move out of his family’s shitty two bedroom didn’t afford much else besides a full scholarship to Columbia and a shiny degree to boot. He didn’t make too many connections, didn’t hobnob to get where he wanted- but something about the articles he published in the weekly newsletter during his time as Managing Editor got him a government job with full dental. 

 

So he’s fine. Cheery, even. Storming the trenches, full of piss and vinegar. He likes to wear J. Crew sweaters with elbow patches, he totes along a water bottle wherever he goes that he balances on top of the steadily growing stack of binders on his desk- yes, he’s got his own office by now, isn’t that wonderful?- and while he’s sorting through the spreadsheet he made to organize seminars, he only thinks of a couple things. 

 

Namely: getting home and watering the slowly dying fern propped up on his windowsill, the one gifted to him by Vanessa from HR after he drove her home from the bar. It’s withering, couldn’t be helped. Perhaps it means something about the future of his friendship with the woman. (It’ll probably go that route if she won’t stop finding bloody costumes for him to wear all over the place). Other things too, like listening to the way his neighbor plays piano in the room above his as he tries and write up his planner for the next morning. Adding another movie to his steadily growing watchlist pinned to the fridge that he know he won’t ever touch. Pouring out kibble because shit, he forgot he was dog sitting for Raleigh fucking  _ Becket.  _ He’s going to try and mount vinyl records above his couch. 

 

Once again, restating for emphasis: this is all well and good. He is perfectly fucking  _ content  _ to be one hell of a personal assistant to Pentecost, and he does his job  _ excellently,  _ by the way. 

 

The problems start when Newt Geiszler is hired. 

 

The problems are  _ synonymous  _ with Newt Geiszler being hired. 

 

The problem, specifically, is that for all the work that Hermann has done over the years- for all the penny pinching and late nights and overtime with no bonus, for all the cancelled dates and dead eyes and caffeine overdoses, for all of the file folders and midnight runs to Staples and morning runs to Starbucks- they are rendered fucking  _ meaningless.  _ Because Newt Geiszler, his title-

 

Executive Assistant. 

 

Executive.

 

Executive, executive,  _ executive _ . 

 

Newt Geiszler wears bracelets to weekly debriefings. Newt Geiszler spilled coffee all down the back of Pentecost’s jacket the instant the man folded it over his chair. Newt Geiszler doesn’t know the appropriate volume to play music at- definitely doesn’t know when the entire goddamn office can hear how  _ I Ran _ is playing it’s sixteenth repeat, volume turned so high that the sound bleeds through his earbuds. And according to every resume he will ever write up, according to every LinkedIn page- Newt Geiszler  _ outranks  _ him. 

 

Worst of all: Newt Geiszler sends back all of Hermann’s carefully edited, perfectly worded writing- even his fucking  _ memos _ \- covered in line after line of this smarmy, scathing,  _ casual _ correction. In a bright red font. Picking apart alleged  _ errors  _ that Hermann can’t even register, for all the blood rushing in his ears at the  _ balls  _ on this guy. And all the critiques, all of the quips and overly-familiarly rude comments lead down to one word at the bottom, one word that’s bolded, italicized, underlined, circled using the draw function in the upper left corner, every single time. 

 

It says “ **_dude_ ** .” 

 

-

 

“Dude” says Vanessa from HR- says Vanessa. They’ve been friends long enough, he can drop the moniker. “You’ve got it bad _.”  _

 

“I do  _ not.”  _ Hermann says, and adds for emphasis, “Shut up.” 

 

She snorts, and props her cheek up on her palm. He’s watching the way she pours her vinegarette dressing over the salad she grabbed from the cafeteria with the other hand, and he can faintly recognize how she got a small tattoo on her ring finger. It’s a colorful drawing of a lemon cut in half. He opens his mouth to ask about it and she’s already pointing an accusatory, manicured finger at him to shut him up. 

 

She flips her curls out of her face with a toss of her head. Or at least, she tries to. A few strands get stuck in her layer of clear lip gloss. “Don’t tell me to shut up! You shut up! I guess I don’t  _ understand  _ it, he’s kind of weird, but I don’t know. He’s kinda cute, maybe, I like how screamy he gets towards the end of the day. Oh! And he and I are totally filling Chuck Hansen’s phone set with pennies gradually so he like, so he’ll get used to the weight and then we’ll take them all out at once so he’ll punch himself in the head. It’s very funny. Newt seems like your type!” 

 

Hermann squints. “My type?” 

 

She traces around the rim of her plastic salad container with the fork she’s using, “You  _ kno-o-w.  _ Your  _ type.  _ Freckles, messy hair, black skinny jeans, uh, totally ready for an impromptu dance party, makes fun of you, ‘cause you like that for some reason, appropriates your sweaters for warmth during the colder months, ate chalk on a dare, probably did Adderall in college-“ 

 

“Are you talking about Newt or yourself?” 

 

She gasps, mock offended. “Both Hermann, keep up! Your two favorite people on earth! We have so much in common actually, ooh- oh my god, what if he also watches Real Housewives? I should ask.”

 

Hermann actively tries to listen when Vanessa monologues, and not just because he’s invested a lot of his personal information in with her and wants to be sure that she’s not inadvertently spilling all of his secrets in between her running commentary on Tendo’s bowties and how she wants to set them on fire. And yet, he still seems to zone out this time, because the looming threat of having to spend more time with Newt, of coming across as visibly  _ interested  _ in spending more time with Newt- He’s aghast. Stricken. Horrified, definitely. 

 

It’s only later after the conversation has ended, when he’s feeling bewildered and fond and a little dazed just like after every conversation he’s had with Vanessa concludes, that he realizes that for all his griping about the assumptions on his character- Well. 

 

He never explicitly  _ denied  _ them. 

 

-

 

He’s an MIT alumni with too many PhDs to be reasonable or necessary. And he stuck  _ gum  _ on the underside of Hermann’s desk. And he’s a complete dumbass, really, the things he writes are wrong on so many levels, too aggressive and iconoclastic and reckless to be reasonable things for a government employee to even consider saying. 

 

(“Pretty sure he’s a Marxist,” says Vanessa, as she wipes excess lipstick away from the corner of her mouth with her pinkie, “That’s pretty sweet. I think we have it in common.”) 

 

But that doesn’t mean he’s not intriguing, at least somewhat. Maybe Hermann’s obsessed. Sue him. 

 

“Hey Gottlieb,” says Newt, and today the man is wearing these jeans that have rips in the knees and a chain coming out of the pocket, dangling somewhere around his hip bone, “Can you open your email already? I sent you a slideshow of turtles that remind me of you, it’s really-” 

 

Hermann sniffs. He is suddenly very focused on fiddling with the stapler in his hands, turning it over and over for lack of better thing to pretend to be doing. “I’ll miss your slideshows quite  _ dearly  _ Newt, but I blocked your address after your fifth, quote, ‘ _ fun memo _ ’, unquote. Perhaps you need to find a new victim for your-” 

 

“ _ Victim _ ? Dude. They’re  _ gifts.  _ I’m hilarious. You suck. And- Like, I only send you that shit because you won’t stop criticizing my  _ emails,  _ and my writing, and my fucking- my  _ press releases _ -”

 

“The sole reason I’ve ever edited your writing is because of how you seem to be obsessed with finding ways to critique mine.”

 

“Yeah, Hermann, because your writing is  _ shitty. _ I’m fixing  _ mistakes,  _ doing you a  _ favor- _ ” 

 

Hermann feels his face flush from his cheekbones to his chest in splotches. It’s incredible how quickly Newt can rile him up like this, it’s a bit concerning that the man has memorized exactly what buttons of Hermann’s to push so easily.  “I’m- I refuse to speak to you!” He says, shrilly. Hermann doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing. “Goodbye, Newton, wonderful conversation.”

 

Hermann, in some sort of haze of poor decision making, spins around in his chair backwards so he’s facing away from Geiszler, facing the wall instead. He has to throw a leg over the side to straddle the back of it, like Captain America in those pictures Newt won’t stop sending him- shit, maybe that’s where he got the idea. He hears a snicker behind him. He’s certain that Newt is infecting him with dumbassery but he’s too stubborn and dug in at this point to turn around. He finds steadying breaths while he examines the motivational posters posted beside the communal fridge, while Newt lets out a disbelieving noise that’s halfway between a laugh and a gasp, somewhere over his shoulder. 

 

“Dude.” Says Newt, “Are you just-” 

 

Hermann shifts in his seat. “No!  _ Quarantined.  _ Don’t speak to me!” 

 

“You’re sitting literally across from me, just because you’re not facing me doesn’t-”

 

“No-o-o! No! No speaking! You’re in time out!” 

 

Hermann doesn’t get a response for a couple seconds. Just when it gets long enough he thinks Newt must have died or walked away or something equally terrible, he decides to spare a quick look over his shoulder to check. He does it very carefully, very slyly, and Newt meets his gaze with a shit-eating grin that’s only steadily growing and he snaps back around so quickly that it causes a crick in his neck. Newt just starts  _ laughing,  _ and there’s the dull thud of him collapsing onto the table. Hermann’s concentrating on the wall and his embarrassment and definitely not the strange broadness to Newt’s shoulder he never noticed before. 

 

“Oh my god,” gasps Newt, “You were checking on me! You love me. So much.” 

 

“Given the legal opportunity, I would not hesitate to strangle you.” 

 

Hermann can’t see it, but he can almost  _ feel  _ the way Newt’s smile stretches even wider across his face.

 

“Wow,” Newt  _ drawls _ , “That actually turns me on, a little bit, if we’re being totally honest.” 

 

-

 

It’s accidental, is what it is. 

 

Hermann is sitting at his futon back at home, with his plush white blanket wrapped around his head and shoulders like a cocoon. It’s a perfectly content night that he’s been having. He made fried rice and was able to use the new brand of olive oil he got from Whole Foods, the only hiccup was that he was forced to wear the “Might I Suggest The Sausage  ↓” apron Vanessa bought him, for lack of anything else. He brewed a cup of sleepytime tea and erased that week’s to do list off of whiteboard pinned up in the kitchen. 

 

There’s no reason that he’d actively choose to ruin his pleasant night. So, logically, he would have ruined it  _ accidentally.  _

 

He chooses to believe that while he’s in his blanket burrito, with his laptop propped up in his lap and mug in the other hand, something must have possessed him to google “Newton Geiszler MIT.” He lives in a very old, renovated building, a ghost wouldn’t be too implausible. Maybe the same thing that caused him to black out and google  “Newton Geiszler” in another tab, and open about six more from the collective links these mysterious ghosts gathered of their own accord. Tragic, really. 

 

The fact that Hermann reads and- god help him-  _ watches  _ a few of the links, that’s on him. 

 

They’re enlightening. Hermann can barely make the connect between the Newt he knows and the interesting, enthralling, enigmatic person he hears in the essays he’d submit during college and the stray writing in magazines and newspapers throughout his life. They have their faults, they have their stupid points, but the voice that breaks through the few clunky pieces is- startling. Captivating. 

 

Not entirely different from the man in his office who has “ _ american id _ ” tattooed across the back of his neck, now that he thinks about it. 

 

(The real disaster strikes when Hermann finds YouTube clips of the man’s  _ band.  _ He thinks that he’s going to have those leather pants and that mesh shirt in his head for the next six months of his life. He doesn’t think he could ever forget, actually. It’s clear Newt watched one too many Freddie Mercury videos and both tried aggressively hard to and failed miserably at dancing like him. It’s embarrassing. Hermann has second hand embarrassment. He saves a jpeg of Newt in costume to his hard drive and buries the video where he does the-hip-thrust-thing in a secret file folder that he renames to “Hermann don’t touch.” )

 

-

 

He doesn’t like Newt Geiszler. 

 

“I don’t like Newt Geiszler.” Hermann says to his reflection in the mirror the next morning, as he’s brushing his teeth. It’s not a lie, not a complete truth either- The two of them have been getting along at least a little better these days, ever since they reached a stalemate at the amount of criticism they could give to one another. And Newt watched a compilation of pranks from the Office, ones he kept trying to pull against Hermann with Vanessa as his aid. His attempts are usually clumsy and poorly thought out, but Hermann has a distinct admiration for the dedication and resolve Newt approaches his childish games with. 

 

It’s the little things. Newt remembers that Hermann gets soy milk in his coffees and writes a little smiley face next to his name on the cup before giving it to him. Hermann puts off shredding papers for three days because he knows how much Newt enjoys doing it, just to hand the trash to him and watch his face light up. Newt, jokingly, offers Hermann a position as the face of his band and Herman, jokingly, tells him to fuck right off. They bounce off of each other when they’re not paying attention to it, their idle conversation is easy and fluid and interesting. 

 

Hermann spits toothpaste into the sink. 

 

-

 

Tendo sighs like a man resigned to the guillotine. He runs a hand through his hair, and Hermann faintly wonders if the hand will come back greasy for all the gel that’s holding his hairdo in place. He accosted him by the water cooler, very transparently drinking his fourth miniature cup of water to continue his conversation.

 

“Gottlieb. Hermann.” Says Tendo, taking a sip. “Hermann Gottlieb.”

 

“That is my name. Wonderful that you know it.” He says. 

 

Tendo laughs a little at that, pausing like he’s thinking over the phrasing of his next sentence. Hermann feels distinctly cornered, shifting his hips to hold the stack of folders a little bit higher up under his arm that he’s carrying, when Tendo continues.  “What have you  _ done  _ to Newt, buddy? The guy is- I mean, you probably know already. You have to do something about it, it’s affecting his work at this point.” 

 

Hermann’s mouth dries out completely, in a split second. “Geiszler? Newt? Newt Geiszler?” 

 

Tendo snorts. “That is his name! Wonderful that you-  _ yes,  _ Hermann,  _ that  _ Newt. The only Newt. Not many people are named after amphibians. But you’ve gotta know what I’m talking about, right? I’m pretty sure the dude is six seconds away from turning in debriefings with ‘ _ N <3 H’  _ written in the margins.” 

 

Hermann can feel the world drop out from under his feet, almost at the same time his stomach leaps up into his throat. He’s hallucinating. “I have no idea what you’re speaking about. The man is nothing but antagonistic with me, I’m sure that he doesn’t-”

 

“Newt  _ literally  _ got giddy for about twenty minutes when Vanessa from HR called him Newt  _ Gottlieb  _ by accident _ ,  _ and I’m  _ pretty _ sure there’s no one else with that name. And I’m pretty sure she called him that on purpose, actually. She’s like that.” 

 

“Newt Gottlieb.” Hermann repeats. It feels like there’s some sort of fuzz clogging up his head, causing certain words to echo around in his brain while the others recede into the dull, ringing background. 

 

Tendo sighs, and looks up at the ceiling like he’s praying for strength. “Oh god. What have I done? Not you  _ too,  _ buddy, stay with me, here! 

 

Hermann drops all his files on the floor in lieu of a response. 

-

 

“Herm!” Says Newt. He stops Hermann right before he leaves to go home after overtime, somewhere between seven and eight pm, when they’re alone in the office. Hermann tightens his grip on the chair he’s pushing in. In the dim lighting- from the desk lamps- Newt looks painted a lot softer than he normally is. There are deep shadows cast over his eyes and it makes his eyelashes look like one smudge- obscures his freckles. 

 

“Yes, Newton?” Says Hermann. He’s watching how Newt shifts under his gaze, the way he’s tosses his jean jacket over his shoulder, the fact that he’s wearing converse to his job. The man doesn’t have a single semblance of professionalism. It’s, okay, it’s  _ refreshing.  _

 

Newt actually looks kind of nervous. Hermann can feel the vibe coming off of him in waves, and it makes him wonder if what Tendo was saying was  _ true _ \- if all the dropped coffees and missed deadlines and fumbled sentences weren’t because of Newt’s incompetence but instead because the man had a serious crush on- 

 

_ Has  _ a serious crush on-

 

“So like,” Newt begins, and Hermann wonders faintly if he should take a seat or just continue on his way out the door, “I just want to say- Fuck, I can’t believe I’m doing this, it’s kind of bullshit- I want to say, like, sorry? I know we were dicks to each other for a while and it was sort of a joke, but it also really wasn’t, and-“ 

 

Hermann’s, for lack of a better word, shook out of his goddamn  _ mind.  _ “Oh.  _ Oh _ , no, no, I suppose I should also apologize for treating you the way I did, but I-“

 

“It’s stupid!” Newt blurts out. “Vanessa from HR just said that it would help with my- with you if I like, confronted our  _ ‘rocky beginning’  _ or whatever and it just-“ 

 

“I appreciate it!” Hermann says. Probably too quickly. “I do, I do, it’s just unexpected, frankly, but I agree.” 

 

Newt nods aggressively a few times, and shoves his hands deep in his pockets. He shifts his weight from foot to foot a couple times, staring fixedly down at a patch of carpeting rather than at Hermann’s face, and Hermann is just- reeling. Smiling, maybe. He almost laughs out loud, but instead hikes the strap of his bag further up on his shoulder and gives Newt a wry smile and pat on the side on his way out, and swears he can can see Geiszler blush in the low lighting. 

 

-

 

“So.” Says Vanessa, and she’s fingering at the scandalously low neckline of her bright red tank top- the one with GRRL plastered across the front of it- “You know how I’ve been having a torrid, passionate, dare I say  _ forbidden  _ affair with the enemy candidate?” 

 

Hermann chokes on the diet pepsi he’s been nursing. “You- You’ve been  _ romancing  _ Liwen  _ Shao _ ? Is that even-“ 

 

She gasps. “Uh   _ yeah _ , Hermann! Oh my god dude, try and keep up sometimes, holy fucking cannoli! You know, it’s not always about you and Newt, I have way crazier shit going on like, all the time. All the time, Hermann.” 

 

And he’s too taken aback at the thought of Vanessa successfully infiltrating the rival campaign and then sleeping with what could be the future president to even be offended about what she said about him and Newt. He wonders if there’s ever going to be a day that she’ll stop surprising him, constantly. 

 

Vanessa groans, and leans against the wall until it smushes her cheek and makes her face look funny. “And it’s like, we all know you two are dating, my thing with Liwen is so  _ complicated. _ ” 

 

“We’re not dating.” Hermann says. 

 

She stares at him so intensively Hermann feels like he’s being pinned under a microscope, or face to face with a  _ shark.  _ She spares a moment to reach a hand across the table and cup his face, deathly serious. 

 

“Hermann Gottlieb,” she says, “I have so much  _ fucking  _ money riding on this, date him for my sake if nothing else.” 

 

-

 

Hermann makes a note on his to do list that night. 

  
  


_ ask geiszler out for a drink (tonight?)  _

**Author's Note:**

> follow me on twitter @weedsbian! or on tumblr at driftcompvtible 
> 
> you thought this was a newmann fic? FOOLS. i aim to blow everyone’s vanessa/liwen third eye right the fuck open


End file.
